


Spin

by Neyiea



Category: Gotham (TV)
Genre: M/M, Spin the Bottle, Underage Drinking, tipsy idiots in like
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-27
Updated: 2019-06-27
Packaged: 2020-05-28 05:33:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,199
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19387513
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Neyiea/pseuds/Neyiea
Summary: A night of going out for drinks morphs into a very early morning of staying in for drinks, and someone decides to introduce Bruce to a party game that he never got a chance to play.





	Spin

**Author's Note:**

> Catch me writing an incredibly niche one-shot instead of doing anything for either of my multi-chaptered fics. I know there is one other person who likes this pairing (you know who you are) so at least I'm not alone. 
> 
> I'm just gonna glossssss over the Bruce x Grace kiss at the end of A Day in the Narrows. They're buddies. They're each other's wingmen. Grace sees what's going on here and she loves and supports these oblivious party boys.

A night of drinking out has transformed into a very early morning of drinking in. One of the girls who’d joined in on their evening of fun, and the one whose parents assumedly owned the penthouse that they were currently occupying, brings forth an empty wine bottle and a full glass of something dark and definitely alcoholic which she presses a little too eagerly into Bruce’s hand.

“You never really went to any parties before you left school,” she says, and Bruce tilts his head to the side and scans her face as he tries to recall if he should remember her, if she was someone who he’d been in classes with way back when. Then he glances around the rest of the room trying to puzzle out if he should recognize anyone else, but Tommy and Grace are the only faces he can put a name to in a sea of strangers.

“I bet you never got a chance to play spin the bottle,” her voice lowers into something that Bruce has come to know is meant to be coy, “do you want to try it?”

“Sure.”

Bruce is always up for new experiences, for good times. He finds himself guided into a circle on the floor, seated beside Grace and across from Tommy, and he sets down the drink and leans back on his hands as he watches as their hostess, who Bruce can’t remember the name of—had she even given it to him, or had she thought he would remember her?—lightly bats the mouth of the bottle to get it to spin. It barely makes a full rotation, and it eventually slows to a stop pointing at Grace.

The girl pouts, likely having meant to cast her aim at someone else, but she leans in to press a quick kiss to Grace’s lips and Grace’s cheeks darken at the brief contact.

“I, uh, guess it’s my turn now,” she says, mostly to herself, and her eyes dart around the circle quickly. Bruce takes his drink in his hand and can’t help but notice that Grace’s eyes always seem to fall on the other girls. She takes a fortifying drink of whatever is in her own glass before she leans forward to take the bottle by the base and spins it with more force than the first girl. Her eyes track around the circle as it spins, and she chews her bottom lip between her teeth while Bruce takes a curious sip of whatever he’d been given.

It burns the entire way down. 

The bottle stops in his direction, and Bruce feels a well-meaning smile pull at his mouth as Grace first averts her eyes, then looks up at the rest of the circle from beneath her lashes as if to ask if she really has to go through with it.

Bruce doesn’t feel insulted by the lack of interest, mostly he feels amused. 

“Come on,” he says, turning his face to the side to blatantly offer a cheek. “Don’t be shy.” He laughs when she darts forward and presses her lips to the side of his face, a whisper of pressure that’s there and gone again in what feels like half of a second. 

He leans forward on his knees to grab hold of the bottle and twist, then he settles back on the floor and waits, heart thrumming in his chest in what could be either excitement or nervousness, but Bruce feels a little too floaty to be able to tell.

He chooses to believe its excitement. What does he have to be nervous about, here, surrounded by people his age who didn’t know the horror of seeing—

The bottle slowly comes to a stop.

Pointing in the direction of Tommy.

He can feel the self-assured smile on his face fade at the edges.

Tommy looks at the bottle, then at him, and then he pointedly sets down his drink and raises an eyebrow in a way that sparks something—not exactly angry, but something similar, maybe—inside if Bruce’s chest.

Tommy turns his face to the side, a mimic of what Bruce had done for Grace earlier, but the smirk painted across his mouth makes it pretty clear that he’s not really doing it for Bruce’s benefit. Tommy is—is mocking him, making fun, not nearly to the extent that he used to, but he obviously doesn’t think that Bruce has it in him to go through with it. He probably doesn’t even expect Bruce to kiss his cheek.

“Well?” Tommy’s eyes glint with poorly concealed amusement. “Come on, don’t be shy,” he echoes Bruce’s own words from a minute ago and Bruce sets his drink down beside him, feeling oddly determined to wipe the smirk off of his face. And he knows how to do it, too.

It’s all about subverting expectations. Tommy doesn’t expect that Bruce is going to go through with kissing him. All Bruce has to do is prove him wrong.

It makes perfect sense in its own hazy way, and Bruce finds himself shifting forward on his hands and knees, not quite as gracefully as he’d like, but he makes it to the patch of floor right in front of Tommy, and without breaking eye contact he takes Tommy’s face in his hands.

There’s a brief filtering of thought, like sunlight through the leaves of a tree on a windy day, that Tommy’s eyes are kind of nice to look at from up close.

And then Bruce leans in and kisses him on the mouth.

Tommy goes absolutely still, and Bruce can feel his smile return, shifting his lips against Tommy’s in a way that makes him feel... Tingly. A soft laugh escapes his mouth, because he feels warm and triumphant and very, very far away from every problem that he’d wanted to leave behind. He pulls away after a moment, his gaze roving over Tommy’s startled expression, and he feels his smile widen.

He licks his lips, and he distantly notices that Tommy’s eyes sharply track the movement as Bruce settles back in his spot, taking his drink in hand once more.

He sends a sly wink Tommy’s way before he takes another sip. Tommy’s eyebrows furrow and his lips purse before he leans forward to spin the bottle. 

Bruce drinks more, and kisses more, and his eyelids begin to grow heavy as he feels like he’s floating further and further away from the demons that he’s been trying to outrun. He tiredly finds himself wondering what other party games he might have missed out on during his unconventional adolescence. 

He must have asked the question out loud without realizing, because someone from across the circle says to him, “seven minutes in heaven,” and Grace makes a strange, squeaky sound under her breath in response to it. Tommy’s gaze, which seems to have been focused on Bruce—and how long had he been looking without Bruce noticing?—falls on Grace and a thoughtful sort of look crosses over his features before he speaks up.

“I think we’ve all had a little too much to drink tonight for anyone to get locked in a closet.”

There are a few grumbles from around the circle, but Grace seems to relax a little, and Tommy’s attention is soon focussed on a girl who seems to be very intent on getting her kiss. It goes on for a little too long, even though Tommy doesn’t really seem to be pressing back into it, and Bruce finds himself averting his eyes, unsure how much of this he really wants to see.

Grace does the same. They share a look and send wry smiles each other’s way and Bruce feels—good. 

Like a normal teenager, sharing incredulous looks with a friend and doing things that he wasn’t necessarily allowed to do. 

Tommy’s lips are shiny with lip gloss when he spins the bottle again, and Bruce closes his eyes as he finishes the last of his drink. He feels as if opening them again is going to require more effort than usual, and he finds himself thinking that maybe he shouldn’t have had the entire glass of whatever their current hostess gave him. 

Everyone goes quiet. 

Bruce lazily opens one eye and finds the bottle pointing at him. His gaze trails to the other side of the circle where he finds Tommy giving him an intent look. 

Bruce turns and slowly sets his empty glass down, planning on bearing his cheek again just to mess with Tommy a little bit, but when he straightens himself out Tommy is already right there, in front of him, and both of his hands slide into Bruce’s hair as he pulls Bruce forward into a firm kiss.

Bruce’s hands come up, fluttering around uselessly since he can’t decide where to settle them—on Tommy’s chest to push him back, on his shoulders to keep himself steady, or at the back of his head to draw him closer—and then Tommy’s fingers twist in his hair hard enough to cause a slight ache and Bruce’s mouth falls open to let out a soft, shaky exhalation. 

His hands finally move, sliding up and over Tommy’s shoulders, then up the back of his neck, skimming into his long hair.

Tommy makes a muffled sound against Bruce’s mouth, and before Bruce has a chance to puzzle over what it might mean he starts pulling away.

Bruce feels… Oddly breathless.

And warmer than he had been before. Too warm, even.

He licks his lips again and this time there’s a faint, chemically sweet flavour left on them.

Tommy retreats to his side of the circle, and Bruce finds himself wanting—Something, he’s not exactly sure what.

And he feels a little dizzy.

“I think I’ve had enough for tonight,” he murmurs, and from the corner of his eye he can see Grace shift beside him.

“It’s almost curfew for me, if I’m late for a second weekend in a row my parents are going to ground me for sure. Do you want to catch a cab?”

“Yeah. This has been—it’s been fun.” He cautiously doesn’t look at anyone, finding he needs a little time to… Recover. He wonders if his cheeks are burning as red as he thinks they are. “But I should be heading out too.”

“We’ll go together,” Tommy says, not sounding as if he’d take no for an answer, as he lifts himself up off of the floor and walks over to their side. He holds out a hand to help Grace up, and once she’s steady on her feet he does the same for Bruce. Bruce stares at the offered limb for probably a little longer than he should, but he does eventually take it.

Tommy’s hand is warm, and his grip is stronger than expected, and Bruce idly considers whether or not it’s the alcohol in his blood that’s making his heart beat so fast.

Probably. It was probably that.

They say their goodbyes, and Grace calls a cab, and soon they’re waiting in the extravagant lobby of the building. Bruce’s eyes flit from the glittering lights to the dark wooden floors to the world outside the glass doors, and when his gaze finally lands on his companions he barely manages to glimpse Tommy’s eyes rapidly turning away.

Grace looks between the both of them, and a strange little smile pulls at the corners of her mouth as if she knows something that they don’t.

Bruce’s eyes drift half shut, and he can’t seem to stifle a yawn. By the time the cab arrives Grace all but herds him into it as if he’s a wayward sheep and makes sure that he’s done up his seatbelt properly. Then she enters the cab from the other side while Tommy follows in after Bruce.

“Same time tomorrow?” Bruce manages to ask, even if he can’t quite seem to manage keeping his eyes open.

Grace makes a vague noise of agreement on his one side, and Tommy answers with a definitive, “yes,” from the other.

“Good. I had a good time tonight.”

He hears Grace let out a very soft laugh. He wonders what’s so funny, but doesn’t have the energy to find out. 

He leans back against the headrest with a sigh.

“Wake me up when I get home.”

“Bruce, you live the furthest away,” Grace reminds him.

And at the same time Tommy says, “sure.”

There’s silence for a few moments, and then Grace softly, teasingly coos, “what a gentleman.”

Tommy’s answering silence has a moody sort of feel to it, which Bruce can perceive even though his eyes are fully closed and all of his other senses are dulled. Bruce bets that if he were to look at Tommy now, he’d be frowning. 

Bruce decides to ignore them both. At least until he figures out that there’s no way for him to get comfortable leaning back into the seat, then he leans over to rest his head on Grace’s shoulder, instead. She giggles and reaches a hand up to pet his hair. 

“Go to sleep, Bruce. Tommy’ll wake you up when you reach home.”

“Mmkay.”


End file.
